Antonio Pizzonia has always maintained that he is a man with a big future in Formula 1, despite the setback he suffered last year and was taken on again by Williams and has been fastest at most of the tests in which he takes part and is now beginning to jostle for position for 2005.

Brides-to-be, if you are hoping for the perfect summer wedding later this year, take some advice from a hack in the Formula 1 press room: plan for your wedding to take place on a Saturday afternoon on a Grand Prix weekend.

Christian Horner's Arden International team has dominated the Formula 3000 scene in recent years and that continued at Imola where Italian rising star Tonio Liuzzi dominated the opening round of the FIA International Formula 3000 Championship,

The key moment in the qualifying process for the San Marino Grand Prix at Imola was when Michael Schumacher went into the Variante Alta chicane and, in his own words, "overdid it a little bit". Michael held on to the moment and the car did not spin, but it was close.

Bernie Ecclestone has concluded a new five-year deal with Britain's ITV network to continue to televise the Formula 1 World Championship. The deal is believed to be worth around $25m a year to the Formula One Group.

The FIA dropped a legislative bomb on Formula 1 at Imola with a list of preliminary proposals for its rules and regulations for 2008. These must be decided by the end of December 2005 and obviously there is going to be a lot of negotiating before the final package emerges.

A few days after the company announced a profit, showing signs that the Detroit giant is on the way to recovery, the Ford Motor Company has had a management reshuffle with Sir Nicke Scheele giving up his role as chief operating officer but staying on as president.

Even though Bernie Ecclestone has recently re-acquired the rights to run the British Grand Prix, this does not mean that the race is not under threat. Ecclestone says that Silverstone "has to come up to scratch" if it wants to stay on the F1 calendar.

The Ferrari team has published its first official "inside story" under the title "Formula Ferrari", a book which covers the team's activities in the last 13 years, from the appointment of Luca di Montezemolo as chairman until the end of the 2003 season.

The new structure at McLaren and Mercedes=Ilmor has now been confirmed by McLaren with Hans-Ulrich Maik, the managing director of Mercedes-Ilmor having left the company which he has been running since November 2002.

Naoki Tokunaga, the Nissan engineer who designed the electronic systems which are used by the Renault F1 team, notably the software used aat the start of the races, has been a man in demnd in recent weeks with offers from his services from Ferrari, Williams and BAR.

The Jordan team is going to run with its usual drivers this weekend but there are still deals being discussed between the team and Dutchman Jos Verstappen. According to our sources, the stories about Verstappen stepping in are not far from the truth but the team would replace not Giorgio Panatano but rather Nick Heidfeld.

Former Ford Europe boss Martin Leach is to join the Ferrari-Maserati Group with rumours suggesting that he will be put in charge of Maserati. The appointment is necessary because Luca di Montezemolo is moving to take on the role of the head of Confindustria, the Italian employers' organisation.

Any ideas that there might have been about a boycott of the Spanish GP by Formula 1 teams protesting against the new European Arrest Warrant are unlikely to go ahead because of commercial pressures on the teams.

Jos Verstappen's website has confirmed a meeting that took place earlier this week between Eddie Jordan and Trust chiefe executive Michel Perridon in Dordrecht, in Holland. Jos Verstappen's manager Raymond Vermeulen was also present at the meeting,

Bernie Ecclestone and Formula One Administration have regained control of the rights to the British Grand Prix from the Interpublic Group - and been paid $93m by Interpublic, which was keen to get out of its motor racing commitments.

The Formula 1 teams all go to Imola having made improvements in their cars and while there has been a lot of coverage for Renault and BAR this does not mean that they will have made the biggest improvement.

The Red Bull Driver Search has not been a huge success in terms of results scored by the drivers involved but at the weekend Scott Speed finally chalked up the scheme's first major result with victory in the fourth round of the Formula Renault 2000 Eurocup championship in Valencia.

Although Formula 1 had a weekend off, there was plenty of racing going on around the world, with the opening round of the Champ Car series at Long Beach and in Europe the first round of the Formula 3 Euroseries.

FIA President Max Mosley has called a meeting of the Formula 1 team bosses in Monaco on May 5 and it thought likely that Mosley will use the gathering to discuss a number of important issues at the moment.

The Champ Car series got underway on Sunday at Long Beach and while the race was a rather dull affair with Paul Tracy leading all the way with Bruno Junqueira shadowing him, the new owners of Champ Car made an effort to attract some A List celebrities and came up trumps.

One of the problems in recent years at Silverstone has been the fact that many of the members of the British Racing Drivers' Club have not seen the new circuits being built around the world and have assumed that Bernie Ecclestone's criticism of Silverstone is based on a desire to get control of the circuit.

The Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank wll be staying with Jaguar Racing in 2005 - if the bank decides to stay in Formula 1. HSBC did receive an approach from McLaren some months ago but told the Woking team tht it was not interested. McLaren later approached Credit Suisse about a deal.

Formula 1 hopeful Scott Dixon has suffered a hairline fracture to his left ankle in a practice crash at Motegi in Japan. The Indy Racing League driver crashed during the first practice session for this weekend's Indy Japan 300.

Argentina's rising star Jose Maria Lopez set the fastest time of this week's Formula 3000 testing in Barcelona, although his best time was only a few hundredths of a second faster than Vitantonio Liuzzi in his Arden International entry.

There is an increasing trend this year for F1 race organizers to run historic Formula 1 cars alongside the modern machinery in an effort to draw in more fans. The latest race to announce an historic event is Canada which will have a field of 30 cars which wll be fielded by the Historic Grand Prix organisation.

It has not been an easy offseason for the Champ Car World Series but this weekend the championship kicks off at Long Beach, having managed to scrape together the 18 cars needed to meet its contractual obligations.

For the last few years the Formula 1 calendar has had much the same shape although the arrival of two new races in 2004 did mean that there had to be a considerable rethink and as a result the Brazilian GP was dropped to the end of the calendar to make way for the high-paying new races in China and Bahrain.

Many young American drivers do not bother with dreams of making it big in Europe and look only to NASCAR where a top level racer can make a pot of gold without ever having to leave the confines of the United States of America.

Mumtaz Tahincioglu, the head of Turkey's Motorsports Federation, says that the Turkish GP will not have tobacco advertising. Turkey is committed to eradicate tobacco advertising and the government will not bend to pressure from Formula 1.

Andrea Bertolini is not a name which rings many bells in Formula 1 circles but the 30-year-old Italian is being allowed to test a Ferrari F2004 today at Vairano, where he and Luca Badoer are doing aerodynamic verification testing.

Bernie Ecclestone has been involved in a very big business deal recently. Although this is not referring to the deal for the Turkish Grand Prix or even speculation that Libya is interested in hosting a Formula One race. This involves his personal interests.

It was interesting to note that at his press conference in Paris the other day, Jacques Regis, the President of the FFSA, made an unusual remark while talking about the problems that he has faced in recent months to keep the French Grand Prix alive.

Experienced Formula 1 observers tend to be very cynical people because of the games that they have seen played over the years in Grand Prix racing. Thus when there appears to be a flash-bang grenade of news, the cynics tend to look elsewhere rather than concentrate on the news being broken...

The FIA President Max Mosley has told the Reuters newsagency that the federation is worried about the speed of the Formula 1 cars and could act to slow them down. Mosley said that according to the Concorde Agreement this could be done in the course of the current season on the grounds of safety.

Jaqcues Regis gave French press details of the budget for the French Grand Prix, explaining how hard it is for a race to survive without government backing. Regis said that his budget for the French Grand Prix is between $19-20m, of which $11.9m will go to pay the fees for holding the race.

Jacques Regis, president of the Federation Francaise du Sport Automobile (FFSA) has announced that the French Grand Prix will be sponsored this year by Mobil 1 although he says that his organisation, which has taken over the running of the event is not going to get any of the money.

New York City yesterday celebrated Ferrari's 50th year in the United States with the Empire State Building bathed in red light . The United States is traditionally Ferrari's biggest market and last year a total of 1350 of the cars were sold to US clients.

Takuma Sato went fastest in the first day of the Barcelona testing, lapping the track in 1m14.687s. Jarno Trulli was close behind with a best of 1m14.702s and Ferrari test driver Luca Badoer was also in the picture with a 1m14.864s.

Michael Schumacher flew to Dublin on Tuesday to support the launch of Europe's Road Safety Charter on the eve of the first global day of action on road safety - which this year coincides with World Health Day.

Perhaps it is inevitable given the disappointing performance at McLaren but there have been rumours that Kimi Raikkonen is less than happy about the developing situation at McLaren and is looking around to see what might be possible in 2007.

There were whispers in Bahrain that there may be a boycott in the pipeline for one of the European Grands Prix this summer as the Formula 1 community pushes home its opposition to the European Arrest Warrant.

It is no secret that BAR needs a new title sponsor in 2006 or 2007 and thus the recent good results could be a major advantage as the team goes into boardrooms around the world. Getting new sponsorship in F1 these days in very difficult particularly if tobacco companies are involved.

Jordan Grand Prix is believed to be negotiating to use Toyota engines and gearboxes in 2005. The deal, which is believed to be a similar to the arrangement between Ferrari and Sauber, may also include aerodynamic consultancy work.

Sunday morning in Bahrain saw high winds and rain, a very rare occurrence in the region which has annual rainfall of less than three inches. The weather is not supposed to continue all day with forecasts of better weather in the afternoon.

Jenson Button topped the times sheets on Saturday morning with his BAR-Honda a few hundredths faster than Juan Pablo Montoya's Williams-BMW with Michael Schumacher third fastest in his Ferrari, albeit four-tenths slower than the Colombian.

Michelin has announced that the tyre failures on Friday afternoon were caused by drainage hatches which had become detached from their concrete bases, creating sharp ridges that damage any tyre which crosses them.

Michelin boss Pierre Dupasquier says that he is not worried about three apparent tyre failures in practice for the Bahrain Grand Prix. Fernando Alonso, Anthony Davidson and David Coulthard all suffered tyre problems on Friday afternoon.

At the moment there are a lot of interesting rumours about who is going where in 2005. What is known is that Ferrari will remain unchanged and that Juan Pablo Montoya will join Kimi Raikkonen at McLaren.

Jenson Button says that he is likely to stay at BAR next year even if Williams is making quiet noises about wanting to get its former driver back again. Button is high on Frank Williams's list alongside Mark Webber, Scott Dixon and Brazil's Antonio Pizzonia.

The appeal by Maurizio Passarini against the decision of an Imola court in December 1997 to clear those involved in the accident that killed Ayrton Senna in 1994, is to be reconsidered, following a judgement by La Corte Suprema di Cassazione, Italy's Supreme Court.